Europe Data Response French & Italian Ind. Production (Apr.)/ Italian GDP (Q1) Today’s Italian Q1 GDP breakdown and industrial production data suggested that the economy might return to growth in Q2. But France’s latest industrial production figures show that the recovery there... 10th June 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Update Fragile recovery hampering Italy's belt tightening The unexpected drop in Italy’s GDP in Q1 underlines the fragility of the country’s recovery and further undermines attempts to bring down its crushing public debt load. 20th May 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly German engine can’t power euro-zone recovery While the German economy expanded by an impressive 0.8% in Q1, this failed to spur growth elsewhere in the euro-zone and the region's GDP rose by just 0.2%. Possible explanations for this are the fact... 19th May 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Commercial Property Update Are Milan office rents poised to recover? In the past few quarters, modest gains in services employment have helped to put a floor under Milan office rents. But the most recent employment expectations data have weakened and we doubt that the... 15th May 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Negative rates are no silver bullet on their own A negative interest rate on banks' excess reserves at the ECB might have some effect on banks' behaviour and at least prove that the ECB is prepared to follow its dovish words with action. But it must... 21st April 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Commercial Property Update Italian office capital values look set to fall further The low level of confidence in the Italian service sector throughout 2013 is consistent with the underperformance of office capital values versus retail. But while services confidence has since risen... 16th April 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economic Outlook Deflation dangers persist The recovery in the European economy appears to have picked up a bit of speed in the early months of 2014. The euro-zone now looks set to expand by 1% or more this year, a significant improvement on... 10th April 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Commercial Property Update What do jobs data imply for the peripheral occupier markets? Since the crisis, employment in the periphery has underperformed the euro-zone average. But recent data does at least show some positives for Portugal. And while sustained employment growth in Spain... 4th April 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Update Veneto vote highlights Italy and EU policy challenges While the continuing independence vote in Italy’s Veneto region may prove of little direct importance, the poll highlights the breadth of challenges facing Mr Renzi’s new Government and the difficulty... 19th March 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Update Renzi's recent reforms are the easy part The measures announced by the Italian PM yesterday represent a valuable short-term stimulus to the economy. But they also raise the cost of failing to implement more difficult structural reforms later... 13th March 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Data Response Italian GDP (Q4) Italy exited its long recession in Q4. But the recovery will struggle to gather enough steam this year to erode the country’s crushing public debt load. 11th March 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Update Is Italy's recovery gaining momentum? Italian economic prospects have improved over recent months, but we still think that GDP growth there will remain weaker than in the euro-zone as a whole, both in the short and medium term. 5th March 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Stars still aligned for more ECB support Despite last week's stronger than expected euro-zone inflation figures, the combination of still very weak price pressures, the strong euro and recent falls in liquidity in the banking sector still... 3rd March 2014 · 1 min read
Global Markets Update Will Spain’s and Italy’s bond spreads continue to fall? The yield spreads of Spanish and Italian government bonds over German Bunds began to fall sharply following the announcement of the ECB’s Outright Monetary Transactions programme in the summer of 2012... 27th February 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economic Outlook Deflation dangers cast shadow over recovery The European economy looks set for another year of weak growth in 2014, with the euro-zone likely to do little more than stagnate. Against that background, the European Central Bank (ECB) is likely to... 15th January 2014 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly The pitfalls in the euro-zone’s road to recovery Although our forecast for euro-zone GDP growth in 2014 of 0.5% is now only a little more downbeat than the consensus estimate, there remain plenty of risks that could yet derail the region's recovery... 6th January 2014 · 1 min read
